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3 for Thursday: Your 3 Best Vacations

Ah, this one is (hopefully) easy for you to answer, but will be fun for the rest of us to hear! What are the 3 best vacations you ever had? A relaxing getaway to a tropical place? An active adventure to rapids/ski slopes/ or mountaintops? Or maybe a great “staycation” in your home town that you’ll always remember. … Please share!

4 thoughts on “3 for Thursday: Your 3 Best Vacations”

1-Lake Tahoe/Grass Valley vacation! This ranks as one of the best. Was like 11 years ago or so and we had a full 2 weeks. We were going to spend most of the time in Lake Tahoe with my mom, brother/sister-in-law and their family at this massive lakeside “cabin.” we travelled through Grass Valley first to visit with Laurie’s former boss and mentor Dixie. We spent a couple of days at her beautiful house. Then on to Tahoe. One of the best vacations ever! Great family time and getaway!

2-NYC with Laurie. ‘Nuff said!

3-Yosemite family vacation! If you’ve never been to Yosemite then GO; if you have been then I don’t have to explain!

Sadly, we are not big vacation people. I have taken a few trips with my kids and I go with my husband to his hometown every summer, but as a whole family – it just doesn’t happen. So…
1 – We used to go to Eastern Washington to play in the Columbia with our boat and jetskis about 3 weekends a month during the summer when the kids were younger (pre driving and social life!) It was great, camp for the weekend and play in the sun and water all day long! The kids got older, boat died…..miss it!
2 – Orlando was a great vacation. I went with my girls and my sister who flew my son from Michigan (college) to surprise me! We did Disney, Gatorland and a bunch of fun stuff!
3 – Hawaii with the kids. They loved it there and watching them was fun! We had a nice hotel on the beach and we got to visit family while we were there too!

Tahoe and Yosemite sound great Chris ( mean Vitamin C), maybe someday I will get there too!

Well, the longer the better! You need a chunk of time to get away from the everyday and rejuvenate your energy for life. Vacations (and staycations!) are critical to our well-being.

AUSTRALIA, NEW ZEALAND, FIJI:
On my first big trip overseas, I became forever hooked on the adventure and the high of travel. The day after final exams that first semester in college, my best friend and I took off for 5 1/2 weeks to Australia. (We’d dreamed about this since our sophomore year in high school.) A couple weeks in, two other friends joined us. At 18, 19 and 21 year of age, we were finally of drinking age Down Under, which meant we were free to go places and meet people. And we did. Every. Single. Day. It was not about the alcohol, just purely social. (Although as I recall, we did imbibe a little.) And the men were, in a word, gorgeous.

Each day was an absolute ball. Exposure to a new culture, trying to decipher the hilarious Aussie slang (not to mention their road signs) and a Scottish brogue that sounded like a foreign language. (“Are you sure your grandparents speak English?” I remember asking.)

We had amusing if not screamingly-funny experiences on a daily basis. (Driving on the left side of the road, renting a car with a stick shift on the left and all having a near miss. It was automatic thereafter. By pure chance being in the right place at the right time, enjoying the ratio of 90 Australia guys from a sailing club on awards night to us 4 American girls. Accidentally wandering onto Hindley street, after being forewarned about this red-light district–seems so benign in retrospect, all things being relative—and having a rip-roaring time just observing other people.

We walked at least 4 miles a day, ate fish & chips with tomato sauce, chocolate bars, and lots of fruity sodas (this was before bottled water) because Adelaide, SA was one of the few ports in the world where ships do not take on water due to the limestone deposits. So you did not drink the water.

The whole trip was charmed. In 1986-87 the exchange rate was fantastic, so our money went far. And Australians love Americans, no doubt about it. (And we tended to stand out a bit, I admit, because between the four of us, we probably had on more makeup than the entire whole of South Australia, the Aussie women preferring a more natural look. And our accents were a draw. So anyway, we were not hurting for attention. All good, clean fun.) As a nation, they kind of see themselves following in our footsteps, still in the pioneer stage discovering new frontiers. Sports-minded, down-t0-earth, easy to laugh, unaffected.

We were there right after the Aussies had won the America’s Cup, the first time in 132 years! They had great fun rubbing it in. (First time I’d ever heard of it, actually, but I played the part, nevertheless, so as not to spoil their victory.) It was their summer, so we hung out and celebrated the holidays with Scottish people that first couple of weeks–her wonderful grandparents had emigrated to Australia, we met all their Scottish friends, old and young, and I learned to love English tea, white with sugar, biscuits and sausage rolls. We tanned (rather, burned to a crisp in the overcast afternoon) on the beach at Christmastime. Then we were off again to New Zealand, Victoria,Great Keppel Island, and Fiji. So many stories, not enough time!

I’ll have to get back to you on the other two fave vacations: a 3-week trip exploring the Middle East (my vary favorite trip so far) and experiencing amazing hospitality and the very best of Arab culture, and summer family trips to Shell Lake, in North Woods of Wisconsin, fishing, picking blueberries, going tubing on the river, and hanging out with our cousins and great neighbors around he lake.